Slashdot Mirror
Bad News From Canada On NetTV And Media Levies
twilight30 writes "Canadian regulators ruled Friday that it is illegal to put broadcast TV signals onto the Internet without permission, dashing the hopes of entrepreneurs hoping to create new Net TV businesses.
An alternate link to the original at CNet is here."
And Dr Caleb writes "In response to this Slashdot story I emailed my Member of Parlament. He responded to me today to say that "Despite strong opposition by the Canadian Alliance to these and other aspects of the bill, the Minister of Canadian Heritage won the day and Bill C-32 Copyright Legislation is now law." And further to say "The law assumes guilt that everyone who buys a blank tape or CD is pirating music - but anyone who uses CDs for data storage, for instance, knows that's not true!"
Distressing that the bill has passed, but refreshing that my MP 'gets it'!"
I don't understand why this is such a shock. I mean, did you really expect that it would be LEGAL to rebroadcast television over the internet without proper permission? Do you think that would be "right"?
Free? Since when is broadcast TV free? I pay for it every time I buy something that is advertised on television, since product sales are how those companies make back ad costs.
So, currently, every time I buy something I'm paying for broadcast TV which, except for PBS and some of the few remaining local stations, is absolute unmitigated crap. I also pay for basic cable, and then pay again for the stuff that's advertised on basic cable; I'm paying to watch ads.
OTOH, in practice I applaud anything that will stop the gradual slide of the Internet towards a broadcast-like, producer/consumer relationship.
All's true that is mistrusted
For me its much more usefull to find old shows online then live broadcasts. My TV bandwidth is much greater then my internet bandwidth, and I get better clearer pictures.
Instead, I'm more interested in legality of sharing old broadcasts. Some of the best shows (like "Probe") will never be shown again or offered in DVD. We recently threw away boxes of tapes of old "Fall Guy" episodes, and it would be great to watch "Barney Miller" again.
In the case of copyright, Eldred makes my favorite point. That copyrights sould be renewable but for an exponentially higher fee every year. That way the pomposness of the Disney's of the world that still make millions off of 70 year old charectars would not block out the rare but good old shows that have been abandoned.
_________________________
OnRoad: Tempering Detroit iron with our own hot air since, well, last week.
So since you purchase CD-Rs with the extra tax, your purchase also implies you have the right to burn music to them? If the RIAA taxes ISP for allowing filetrading then it is implied that I have bought that music and I now "own" or at least have "leased" it. Such as in the way that the US government taxes me which implies that I have the right to "lease" the use of the roads even though they are owned by the government.
Maybe I should be able to redeem my CD-R receipts at a music store for music purchses if I dont use them for musical purposes right?
This all makes me think.
-Foxxz
The Canadian Alliance is a political party that is not in power right now. The Minister of Heritage is a member of the party in power now (the Liberals). Since it's a majority government, the party in power can do whatever they want, and the other parties can just slow things down a bit.
There is no viable alternative to the Liberals, so they can and do whatever they want.
For example, a vet got his benefits cut off due to a government error. His representitive (who happened to be Liberal)said "you didn't vote for me, why should I help you?" The prime minister backed up the representitive and basically said they shouldn't have to do anything since they're in charge.
There's hundreds of examples, but Canada is basically being run as a tyranny now, and this new law being muscled through is just another example.
Jason
ProfQuotes
Each riding (electoral area) elects 1 representative to the federal government, each elected person is a Member of Parliment (MP).
The political party with the most seats is the governing party, the second most is the opposition.
The other parties don't have official titles.
From the ruling party (generally) all the departments/minitries are run by an MP, the opposition gets their critic for each.
Then they get in a big room, and argue with each other.
That is the house of commons.
"The law assumes guilt that everyone who buys a blank tape or CD is pirating music"
Okay, that's NOT true, but the RIAA believes it is and the RIAA is the be-all and end-all unfortunately.
But with DRM and copyright extension laws, etc, everyone who uses a blank tape or CD WILL BE PIRATING whatever they put on the tape/CD, because the way we're heading we won't have the right to create backups/copies of anything except what WE create by ourselves. So backing up your ogg collection (ripped from your copy-protected CDs) may end up being considered "pirating". Making a copy of that software CD because it's starting to get a bit scratched and then having to get a crack to ignore the CD-serial check may be considered pirating. Hell, in the end, using computers for anything but content CREATION may be pirating.
Okay, that's a pretty extremist view, but think about the situation we had 10 or 15 years ago - copy-protection? inability to create legal backups? paying a tax to cover alleged piracy as reported by an organisation that can't count CD burners? Where will it end?
This sig intentionally left bla... dammit!
Who's got the whiteout?
Don't think for a minute that he actually "gets it". As a member of the official opposition his opinion becomes the exact opposite of everything the government says. If the Alliance ever won an election they'd be jumping in bed with whatever lobbiest was paying the most, just like any other politician.
I'm Canadian, and I know there are lot of Canadians who also share the same ignorance/lack of information on how our Canadian government works but I hope this helps:
The Canadian Alliance is the "Opposition party" or the group of elected individuals in our House of Commons (sorta like the House of Representatives in the states). The difference in our elected officials is that we have more than just two large parties. There's the Liberal Party of Canada, NDP, PC Party of Canada and other parties like the Green Party, The Communist party, etc. (I don't have their URLs, but I'm sure google would help)
To better understand Canadian government, check this out: Structure of the Government of Canada
The Minister of Canadian Heritage is this person named Sheila Copps who is in charge of keeping Canadian Culture 'Canadian'. A lot of people don't like what she does as a lot of times it removes freedoms from the people of Canada and makes things more expensive (our taxes pay for her position and her policies/ideas).
To answer your actual question: Is this one individual overruling a lobbying type group or a governmental group?
The bill became law despite the Canadian Alliance fighting against it.
Television isn't free. Every minute of commercial TV is a transaction exactly equivalent to buying a loaf of bread. What people don't seem to get is that the purpose of TV isn't to entertain the masses... the purpose of TV is to sell audiences to sponsors. The sponsors are the consumers; the audience is just part of the product.
Once you understand this, all the seemingly stupid decisions about cancellations and the like become much clearer. OK, they still suck, but at least they're clear.
--Larry
Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence
I find in the records from last session:
And I gave up crack hours ago."History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme." Mark Twain
You don't have to pay to mail your Member of Parliament. Just mark the letter "On Her Majesty's Service" and mail it to their office. No $0.48 needed, even for a real letter.